


The Shape of Edgewater

by Bonymaloney



Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Crack, F/M, Frottage, Max gets what he thinks he wants, MerMay, Mermax, Pirate AU, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, is disappointed, mermaid au, merman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 11:08:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24469975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bonymaloney/pseuds/Bonymaloney
Summary: The fearless Captain of the Unreliable is saved from drowning by a fierce and beautiful creature. To repay him, she must find the thing he’s spent his entire life searching for.
Relationships: The Captain/Maximillian DeSoto
Comments: 3
Kudos: 25





	The Shape of Edgewater

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by an absolutely beautiful painting by tumblr user Jackalgirl. I can’t recommend you check it out enough, as well as the rest of their TOW content.

The water was beautifully clear, but the salt of it blurred her vision no matter how hard she struggled to see. Her nose and throat burned. Her limbs were heavy, her clothing weighing upon her like drag anchors. Her ribs ached with the desire to breathe in, her heart pounding viciously against them. 

Pearl the Stranger, Captain of the Unreliable, wasn’t feared because she was particularly cruel for a pirate, or bloodthirsty, or insane. It was simply that if she wanted you dead, you were dead. Once she’d set a course, she would never give up. And she knew that if she gave up now it would mean her own death. But her vision was blackening, and she had forgotten which way was up…

Strong arms seized her, drawing her close. The body holding her was solid and not particularly warm. A mouth pressed against hers, and she felt outrage, panic and sheer confusion surging. Against her will, her lips parted… 

And suddenly, the pain in her head and chest was fading, her vision clear. A man floated in the water before her, watching her with an arrogant tilt to his head. She thought for a moment that she was finally drowning, and this was psychosis of the deep. His eyes were green and cool, strands of his dark brown hair rippling in the current. He was smiling at her, but there was something threatening about his lips and the set of his brow. Twin streams of bubbles rose from delicate flaps of skin, one on each side of his neck, and suddenly she understood. 

The merman reached for her, and she tried to ward him off, but he pinned her hands easily behind her back, wrapped her braid around his other hand and forced his lips against hers once again. Oxygen flowed into her, and she felt alive, vital and grateful. 

The man drew back, but he didn’t release her. Instead, he pressed his forehead against hers. 

_You’re welcome._ The voice in her head was cool and amused. _But I’m not letting you go just yet. You owe me, and I need someone like you. Someone who can go to the surface._ It was as though she was hearing him with her entire skull, rather than in her ears. It reminded her of the times she’d heard whale song. 

Pearl opened her mouth to protest. The merman laughed at her as the air streamed out of her. She bared her teeth at him, grabbed him by the hair and pressed her head more firmly to his. 

_You better let me go_ , she thought back at him. At the same time, her other hand went to her dagger. She let him feel the flat of it against his belly, right above the point where pale skin shaded into scales. 

His grin broadened, making him look fierce and genuinely delighted. 

_You might be the very person I was looking for._

He spoke to her for a while, pausing occasionally to breathe oxygen into her. His name was Maximillian, he was a priest, and he was looking for something. Eventually, he carried her up towards the surface with smooth powerful strokes of his tail. 

“...so that’s what happened. And now, we have to find the Lost Dagger of Bakonu.”

“A real life mermaid? No way! You get all the luck.”

“Merman,” she corrected her cabinboy. “And I did almost drown.”

Felix rubbed sheepishly at the back of his neck. “Sorry, boss…”

“We don’t have to.” Nyoka the Hunter was as smart and level headed a lieutenant as she could wish for, when she was sober. “Creatures such as that can’t live more than a minute or two on the surface, in my experience. We’d never see him again.”

“Yeah, but a debt’s a debt. Besides, treasure hunting is fun.”

Pearl knew she could count on her surgeon to back her up. The woman hated to owe anything to anyone. It was the only moral principle she seemed to possess, but she was a skilled sawbones and fit in well with the crew. 

The only one missing was the bosun. She spent most of her days belowdecks, keeping the Unreliable in good repair, and cleaning and tuning the big cannon she’d nicknamed Sam. But a treasure hunt meant resupply, and that meant parlay with Captain Tennyson, so Pretty Parvati wasn’t likely to complain. 

The decision was made, and the crew set sail. Pearl retired to her cabin, marked the latitude and longitude of where she’d first gone overboard on her map. As she felt the Unreliable begin to rise to the wind, she cracked open a bottle of rum and thought of the merman’s cool lips and his deep green eyes. 

Favours were called in, sea battles were fought, lesser pirates were killed or else pressed into their service. And many months later, the Unrelible dropped anchor over the same mark on the map. The crew crowded the railing, peering down at the deep blue water. 

A lithe form broke the surface, and they caught sight of a curved back and a muscular tail, before the shape disappeared into the depths once again. 

“Coulda just been a dolphin,” Nyoka said.

“Well it can’t be a mermaid,” Black-Heart Ellie grinned. “It doesn’t look anything like Felix’ arm.”

The treasure hunt had yielded a good amount of loot besides the Dagger of Bakonu itself, and with his share Felix had paid for a new tattoo. A winking mermaid on his arm; the tail was supposed to move when he flexed his bicep, but it looked more like the painted sign on the Groundbreaker Docks above the stall that sold fried eels. 

Twin streams of little silver bubbles appeared at the surface, and Pearl knew. She stripped down to her delicates, strapped her knife to her waist. The dagger was in a leather sheath marked with strange gold designs, faded and tarnished. It hung on a leather cord around her neck. 

She fastened little pouches to her ankles, weighted with lead shot. It would keep her upright, and when she pulled the cords, the shot would release and she would resurface. Pearl climbed over the side and glanced back at her crew. Their cutlasses were drawn, and Nyoka held a crossbow at the ready. She gave her a nod. 

“Relax, guys, I’m gonna be fine,” Pearl said, and jumped. _I hope._

She drifted down until her feet rested on the soft sandy sea bed. Green fronds waved around her, and a little way off she could see a shoal of fish, silver and pink. The water was cool and silky against her bare skin. Looking up, she could see the way the blue became lighter, could vaguely see the outline of her ship, and then a dark, powerful shape moved between her and the surface. 

Maximillian leaned in and gave her air, before pressing her forehead against his. 

_Did you bring it?_

In response, she lifted the knife over her head. The merman grinned, baring his not-quite-human teeth, and snatched the leather cord out of her hand. He drew the dagger and held it up. 

While he studied it, she studied him. His expression was intelligent, intense. His shoulders and chest were well muscled, his hands long and elegant. Spiralling tattoos marked his shoulders and back, and one wrist was wrapped in blue beads. She wondered whether they were signs of his priesthood. His tail was a deeper blue than the water around them, sinuous and somehow a little obscene. 

Pearl felt her chest beginning to ache, and she waved at him. To his credit, he did look a little sheepish as he leaned in and gave her another breath. Then, to her surprise, he pressed the dagger to his thumb. Blood so dark it was almost purple welled out of the cut, forming a cloud in the salt water. She was so astonished she gasped, and he laughed at her. 

He leaned in and gave her another breath, but this time he stayed close. 

_This is exactly what I’ve been looking for! It’s been so long… This will be the answer to everything._

He sheathed the dagger and hung it around his own neck. Then he put his hands on the small of her back. They were cool, but very strong. Pearl felt a sudden warmth at the pressure of his body against hers. He glanced down for a moment, then his eyes met hers. His intent was clear, as he waited for her permission. 

Pearl ran her fingers through his rich brown hair, coarse but surprisingly soft, and he kissed her. He alternated giving her oxygen and stroking her tongue with his own, gently tasting her mouth, and it made her light headed. Maximillian explored her body, appearing very interested in her breasts. With one arm around her waist, he cupped her and then drew her nipples into stiff peaks of pleasure. She stroked his solid ribs and his back, squeezed the muscles of his arms, then trailed her fingers lower, marvelling at the contrast between his skin and his scales. 

_Open your legs for me_ , he said, and she wrapped them around his waist. She clung to his shoulders and they moved together, close and sensuous. Her breasts pushed into his chest, and his thick, muscular tail moved between her thighs with a rhythmic, rippling pressure that was utterly delicious. The scales slid against the silk of her delicates, and she ground against him, desperate to intensify the sensation. 

His hands gripped her buttocks in return, directing her to what seemed to be a specific point along his tail, as the tip of it coiled around her ankle. Pearl was more than happy to oblige, chasing her orgasm as he fastened his teeth in her shoulder. She moaned and gasped, tasting sea water in her mouth as she forgot herself. 

Maximillian pressed his lips to hers a final time and breathed into her, and she felt a sudden shot of warmth against her groin and her belly. He was ejaculating some sort of… stuff, from a well concealed slit that ran down front of his tail. She was nonplussed, but at the same time his face contorted with pleasure was so damn handsome...

He released her and swam spirals around her, his body twisting and arching until he came to a halt in front of her, lazily beating his tail with a smug smile on his face. Pearl laughed, then watched with dismay as an uneven silver bubble of air burst away from her. She watched it drift up to the surface, and when she looked back at Maximillian, he was frowning. He looked down at her legs, and she suddenly became very aware of the little bags of shot bound to her ankles. 

She reached down and released one, and Maximillian released the other. He held her and breathed for her as they floated, his body lithe and strong. When they broke the surface, he pressed his forehead against hers. 

_Thank you_ , he said, and he was gone. 

Other business took her ashore for a while, and she tied up at the pirate kingdom of Fallbrook, ruled over by the fearsome Old Malin. She and Pearl were on good terms, and so the cabin she gave her was luxurious and well appointed, built out over the water. One morning, too early for the decadent citizens of the kingdom yet too late to be even an extremely dedicated drinker, there was a knock at the door. Pearl cocked back the trigger on her pistol, and answered it. A man stood there, tall, pale skinned, and completely nude apart from the dagger hanging in its sheath around his neck. 

Maximillian’s tail was gone, replaced by a pair of sturdy legs with jutting hipbones. His penis was long and slim, bending a little to his left. A fine strip of hair ran down the centre of his body, but his tattoos appeared unchanged. Little beads of water dotted his skin, and he had goose bumps in the cold night air. 

He held up the dagger. He pointed at his feet, then at his mouth, open but soundless. His expression was utterly furious. 

Pearl opened the door and beckoned him inside.


End file.
